Naruto: A Different Path Rewritten
by Sky Zephyrus
Summary: Rewrite of the original. Kushina survived the childbirth and had an adopted daughter before she married to Minato. Along with his status as a Jinchuuriki never revealed, how will Naruto's life changed from what we've known? AU NaruSaku


Naruto: A Different Path –Rewrite–  
I do not own anything related to Naruto

Summary: Rewrite of the original. Kushina survived the childbirth and had an adopted daughter before she married to Minato. Along with his status as a Jinchuuriki never revealed, how will Naruto's life changed from what we've known? AU NaruSaku

**A/N: Hey there. As said on the summary, this is the rewrite of the original which is my very first fanfic. I decided to rewrite it since somehow it looked so rushed and I missed so many good scenes also to fix several mistakes. I'll talk more later on the end. For now, sit back and enjoy my story.**

Chapter 1: Where Everything Changes

Tonight was a disastrous night in Konoha. The great Bijuu, Kyuubi no Youko suddenly appeared out of nowhere and attacked the village after the sunset, nearly destroying the village and killed so many people on its rage. Many ninjas were also slain when tried to repel the demon away from the village. Perhaps the greatest loss to the village and its people was the Yondaime Hokage, Namikaze Minato, the youngest Hokage and arguably the strongest so far. He used a forbidden jutsu in exchange of his life to defeat Kyuubi, or so the surviving ninjas thought to themselves. The truth was Minato had used a fuuinjutsu to seal the demon away on his own son, Namikaze Naruto, whom born several hours earlier. Now the said baby was safe with his mother in her hospital room along with other occupants who knew about the truth about Kyuubi was also there.

Namikaze-Uzumaki Kushina gently rocked her baby with many emotions running on her head. It wasn't supposed to be like this. Her son should be living with a complete family with her, her husband, her adopted daughter, and several close relatives. A normal and perfect life, but Kyuubi suddenly came and ruined it all, making her husband gone and her son became the Jinchuuriki of the said demon fox. There's no need of genius to guess what will happen to Naruto if his status as jinchuuriki was known to the public. His life will be harsh with hatred and fear always haunted him before he lost himself to the darkness, though she doubted the latter will happen to him. She will be damned as a mother if Naruto had a life like that and as Minato's wife if anything wrong happened to his living legacy. Unfortunately, Minato had already said a will to announce Naruto's status as the Jinchuuriki so he could be viewed as a hero that saved the village, but the red haired woman knew better. That's why she had gathered the people who knew about the whole 'sealing-Kyuubi-in-Naruto', namely the recently reinstated Sandaime Hokage Sarutobi Hiruzen, Gama Sennin Jiraiya who was also Naruto's Godfather, Senjuu Tsunade the Namakuji Sennin and the person who helped Kushina during the childbirth, and Minato's prized student who was also an ANBU captain Hatake Kakashi.

"What's the matter Kushina? Is there something you need?" asked Hiruzen after he put a silencing jutsu to the room.

Kushina continued to rock her son before she looked at Hiruzen on the eye. "It's about Minato-kun's will. I don't want you to announce Naruto's status as Jinchuuriki to the public."

Hearing that, Hiruzen raised an eyebrow. "I understand your fear about Naruto's life in the future if his status as Kyuubi's living prison, but this is your husband's will. It will be disrespecting him if we do convey his last wish."

"And it will be disrespecting his sacrifice more if Naruto grew up in a situation where he was surrounded by fear and hatred," Kushina argued, her blue eyes were glaring. "It's not like I don't trust the people of Konoha or my husband's judgment on this, but I'll be damned as a mother if anything should happen to Naruto."

"I agree with Kushina on this, sensei," Jiraiya said, his face were serious. "After anything happened today, I hardly believe people will let go their fear of Kyuubi. It will be easier to them if they put their fear and hatred to someone else weaker than them. In this case, it will be Naruto."

"What about Hokage-sama declared a law that forbids anyone to speak the truth about Kyuubi if Naruto's status revealed to the public?" Kakashi suggested.

"That won't work, Kakashi. In fact it will only make the situation much worse," Tsunade replied with a frown.

There was silence the room before suddenly baby Naruto cooed and tried to reach for his mother. Kushina smiled and she wrapped her fingers around her son's. A sigh escaped from Hiruzen's lips before he smiled a little.

"Very well, I will not convey on Minato's last will regarding Naruto's status as the Jinchuuriki of Kyuubi. But remember Kushina, Naruto must knew about his burden later on when he is older."

"Thank you, Jii-chan," Kushina said with a smile before she turned to her son. "Your life will be different, Naruto. You will be always surrounded with love and you will never be alone. Me, your sister, and everyone else that care about you will always at your side."

Baby Naruto looked at his mother for a moment before he laughed merrily.

X-O-X-O-X-O-X-O-X

6 years later…

A kunai was struck dead right in the center of the target and Naruto turned to his sister whom was nodding approvingly before a grin broke in his face. Ever since one year ago, Naruto had started his ninja training under the tutelage of his mother and his sister. He said that he wanted to be a great Hokage that surpassed his father, much to his mother and sister's amusement. He only get the basic trainings, like jogging around the backyard, taijutsu kata practice and sparring, tapping into his chakra—several ANBU came to his house since he practically emitted a high-Jounin level chakra, and kunai and shuriken training just like today. Kushina and his adopted sister—Setsuna will monitor his training while giving advices and pointers.

"Good job, Naruto. Maybe after this we will move on to moving targets if mom said so," praised Setsuna.

Uzumaki Setsuna was a sixteen years old girl with black hair tied into spiky ponytail with two long side bangs and blue eyes. She was adopted by Kushina ten years ago when her village was ransacked and destroyed by bandits and she was the only survivor.

"Hehe, I know I am that good," Naruto boasted.

Setsuna grinned as she walked to her brother and messed with his hair. "You sure are cocky, aren't you brat?"

"Hey, stop that! I'm not cocky! I'm confident!" the blonde protested as he swatted his sister's hand.

"Remember Naruto, there is a fine line between confident and arrogant," said Kushina as she walked to the backyard. "You did great today, so why don't you go outside and play?"

"But mom, I want to train some more so I can be an awesome Hokage!" Naruto whined.

"No buts, you'll rest for today and play outside. That's an order. Who knows you will also have fun there, too," Kushina said before she turned to Setsuna. "Setsuna, can you watch over your brother?"

"Sure thing, mom," Setsuna replied as she dragged Naruto by his arm. "Come on little maelstrom, but first you'll take shower because you're stink and no one wants to play with someone stink!"

"Hey, let me go! I can take shower by myself!" Naruto protested as he tried to pry off from his sister, but to no avail.

Kushina just shook her head amusedly before she cleaned the backyard and prepared the dinner.

X-O-X-O-X-O-X-O-X

Naruto was on the way to the park with Setsuna while the villagers were greeting him. It was no secret that he was the son of the legendary Yondaime Hokage and his looks didn't help to hide his identity. He was practically identical to his father with the same spiky blonde hair and blue eyes, only Naruto had three thin black lines on each of his cheeks, like whiskers. The whole village practically kissing the ground where he walked and while it felt good to be respected like this, Naruto wasn't bothered with things like titles, names, or someone related to him—a wisdom implanted by his mother. He loved and respected his father a lot, but he didn't want to be seen only as the son of Yondaime. Naruto just shook his head and kept walking with his sister.

"Alright, here we are," Setsuna said as they arrived on the park. "You go have some fun and don't get into trouble, okay?"

"Okay," Naruto replied before he went further inside the park.

Setsuna smiled a bit as she saw her brother off. She was about to sit on a nearby bench when she heard someone called for her.

"Hey, Setsu-chan! What are you doing here?"

The black haired girl turned around to see her best friend Mitarashi Anko approaching.

"Oh, hey Anko-chan!"

Back to Naruto, he was looking around the park to found something or someone to play with. Since he was busy with his training, he didn't have any friends to play or hang out with. It was then when he saw group of kids gathered together. He didn't know what was going on, but he decided to find out.

"Hey look at her! She's a weird girl!" said one of the kids. It seems they were bullying a girl.

"Yeah, you tell her! She has pink hair! What a weird hair!" another one chimed in.

"And her forehead is so huge! Even the Hokage mountain was smaller than her forehead!" another bully added the insult.

"Ugly! Weirdo! Forehead!" the bullies kept on calling the girl with insults until she cried. Seeing their target was crying the bullies were openly laughing at her.

Naruto was angry right now. Picking up a pebble nearby, he then threw it up at one of the bully—the largest one since Naruto thought he was the leader— which hit right on the back of his head.

"Ow! Who throw that to me?" the bully said as he turned and saw Naruto was readying another pebble.

"I did and leave that girl alone!" he yelled.

"You dare to order me around? I am Yanagisawa Daigomaru, the son of civilian councilman Yanagisawa Murata! Just to tell you I also attend the Ninja Academy!" the bully leader boasted.

Naruto snorted at that. "I don't care if you were Kami-sama herself. I'm going to kick your ass for bullying that girl!"

The crying girl now was looking at him. No one had ever stood up for her. Any other kids will just laugh at her and teasing her hair and forehead. Why this kid helped her?

"Why did you care about her? You don't even know her! She's just a weird girl!" said the fat boy.

"You were bullying her and that's enough for me to beat you up!" Naruto spat back at the bully. "Besides, you're the weird one. Why you would bully a girl like that? She looked like a normal girl to me."

The girl gasped slightly when she heard that. He didn't think her as a weird girl! She felt a warm feeling on her chest as his words echoed on her head.

Daigomaru growled at Naruto as he cracked his knuckles. "You want to play hero? Fine, but don't blame me if you run to your mommy while crying!"

Naruto only glared at the round boy as he settled himself into the taijutsu stance his mother had taught him before. Daigomaru ran at the smaller blonde with a cry and punched Naruto, only to have the blonde pivoted on his foot to dodge the punch. Naruto then elbowed the larger boy stomach before throwing a chakra enhanced punch to his nose and effectively breaking it.

"Aaaahhh! My nose! It hurts! Daddy, it hurts!" Daigomaru cried as he fell to the ground while holding his broken nose.

The other bullies were effectively stunned as they saw their ring leader defeated by someone half of his size. It was then when one of them realized who the heck this kid is.

"Y-Y-You're the Yondaime's son…Namikaze Naruto…" he said with shaky voice, loud enough to be heard everyone else in vicinity.

"You know me?" Naruto asked, the bully answered by nodding rapidly. "Good, then can you do me a favor?" the bully nodded again. "Get him out of here and make sure I'll never see his face again. "

The other bully and his cronies took away Daigomaru whom was still crying. Naruto then turned to the girl he saved whom was looking at him in awe.

"Are you alright?" he asked. Now Naruto was able to take a good look on her. She had shoulder length pink hair with her bangs reached to her green eyes that were still red after she cried earlier. She was wearing blue shirt and white pants. _'Kami, she's so…pretty…'_ he thought to himself.

The girl now also was able to take a good look on her rescuer, the son of the legendary Yondaime Hokage. He had spiky blonde hair and warm sapphire blue eyes. He also had three black lines on each of his cheeks like whiskers—which she found it very cute. He was wearing navy long sleeved shirt with red swirl on each of his shoulders and dark green pants. "Y-Yes, I'm a-alright," she answered.

"Good to hear that then," Naruto grinned with a fox like grin.

Seeing that grin of his, the only thing that the pink haired girl could think was, _'Kami, he's really cute…'_

"Hey, are you all alone?" Naruto asked.

"Y-Yes, I-I never had any f-friends because the other kids would r-ridicule me," the girl answered.

"Why they would ridicule a pretty girl like you?"

The girl looked surprised when she heard that. "Y-You think I-I'm pretty?"

Naruto had just realized what he had just said and he had the decency to blush and looked at the ground while he scratched the back of his head bashfully. "Y-Yeah, I mean you have beautiful hair and…uh beautiful eyes..."

The girl blushed at that. No one had ever complimented on her like that, save for her mother and this boy—the son of the Yondaime Hokage nonetheless. Once again, that warmth from the earlier returned to her chest.

"Uh, so why they picked on you? Y-You don't have to answer that if you don't want to…" Naruto asked while he was still embarrassed from the earlier.

"T-They picked on me because…" she was hesitating right now. She was afraid if she showed to him her forehead, he will pick on her like the other kids. Gulping, the girl parted the bangs of her hair and showed her forehead. "…it's because my forehead. It's so big that the other kids would pick on me…"

Naruto just stared at her forehead. Feeling uncomfortable, the girl let her hair covered her forehead once again.

"It's ugly, isn't it?" the girl said dejectedly as she was about to cry again.

"It's big, but it's really cute," Naruto said. The girl was surprised to hear that as she looked to his smiling face, showing no lies behind of it.

"Y-You mean it?"

"Yeah, it its. Besides, it shows that you are really smart, right?" the blonde added with a grin.

By just looking at his grin, the girl couldn't help but to feel elated and she looked at Naruto shyly.

"D-Do you want to be my friend?"

"Of course! My name's Namikaze Naruto. Nice to meet you!"

"I'm Haruno Sakura. Nice to meet you, Naruto-kun."

Naruto grinned at her while Sakura was smiling at him as they shook hands.

"So Sakura-chan," Naruto started as he looked around the park, missing the blush on Sakura's face in return. "What you usually do around the park?" The blonde spotted two see-saw boards, three sets of swings, two sandboxes, two slides, a carousel, and a jungle gym.

"I-I usually played by my own since I-I don't have any friends," Sakura answered. "What about you, Naruto-kun?"

"Me? I hardly come to the park because I usually train back at my home," Naruto answered.

"Why do you train when you can play out side?" Sakura asked curiously.

"Well, it's because I want to be an awesome Hokage, more than my father was! That's why I train so hard until I can surpass him!" Naruto proclaimed proudly.

Sakura giggled at his proclamation. Seeing her giggles, Naruto grinned at his pink haired friend.

"Hey let's play with the swing! I'll push you high, okay?"

"Okay, but don't push me too high because I will fall," Sakura replied.

"Don't worry! If you fall I'll catch you, Sakura-chan!" Naruto assured.

Sakura smiled at him in response. As they played together, they didn't realize that Setsuna was watching the whole event after Naruto chased the bullies away. The ebony haired girl smiled as Naruto pushed Sakura on her swing and she laughed happily.

"You sure know how to pick a girlfriend, Naruto," Setsuna said to herself before a grin etched on her face. "Just wait until mom hears this."

Naruto and Sakura were having fun with each other. They had lost the time how long they had been playing together and they didn't care about that. Now they stepped down from the see-saw board after they played with it.

"That was fun, Sakura-chan! I never had fun like this aside from my training!" Naruto said with a wide grin.

"I'm glad you enjoyed it too, Naruto-kun," Sakura replied while smiling shyly at him.

"Hey, are you coming here tomorrow too?"

"Yeah, I think."

"Cool, let's meet again here tomorrow! We can play together like today and I'll show you some neat trick I learned from my training!" Naruto said enthusiastically.

Sakura nodded before she held out her pinky finger. "Y-You promise?"

Naruto grinned in response and entwined his own pinky finger with hers. "Yup, it's a promise!"

The pink haired girl smiled brightly at him as they shook their entwined pinky finger before they broke off.

Setsuna entered the scene from her hiding place at this moment with a smile on her face.

"Are you having fun yourself, Naruto?"

Naruto turned to see his sister. "Sis! Are you watching us all this time?"

"Of course, do you think I'll let you off from my watch just like that?" Setsuna scoffed. She then turned to Sakura whom cowered behind Naruto. "Easy there little girl. I just want to thank you for playing with my little brother here."

"Um, y-you're welcome," Sakura replied as she stood next to her first friend.

"Come on Naruto, it's time for dinner. Say goodbye to your friend here," Setsuna said.

"Alright, I'll see you tomorrow Sakura-chan."

"Yeah, I'll see you tomorrow, Naruto-kun."

The two friends then parted way and went to their respective home. With Naruto, he and Setsuna reached Namikaze compound after fifteen minutes of walking. All the way there, Naruto hadn't stopped smiling, much to Setsuna's amusement.

"We're home!" Naruto said as he entered his house with Setsuna followed suit.

"Welcome home, dear. How do you feel after playing outside?" Kushina asked to her son.

"It was great! I meet this bullied girl and I saved her from those meanies after I teach them a lesson. She is pretty, you know! Her name is Sakura and we become friends and we played together! It was fun! We promised to play again tomorrow!" Naruto explained to his mother his day outside with all enthusiasm he could put with.

Kushina smiled. "See? I told you can have fun there. I tell you what, tomorrow we will start the training earlier so you can play with Sakura longer."

"Really, mom?" Naruto asked and his mother nodded. "Alright! You're the best, mom!"

"Okay now, wash your hand and foot because dinner will ready soon," Kushina said.

Naruto quickly left to do so, leaving Kushina and Setsuna in the living room. Seeing her adopted daughter had a mischievous glint on her eyes, the red haired former Jounin instantly knew what it meant.

"No Setsuna, you won't tease your brother.

"Aw, mom! Can't I tease him for just a little bit? You're spoiling him too much," Setsuna whined.

Kushina chuckled at her reaction. "Rather than that, help me set the table will you?"

With Sakura, several minutes earlier…

Compared to Namikaze compound, Haruno household where Sakura lived was much closer to the park, only need five minutes of walking to reach there. Sakura entered her home with a bright smile on her face.

"Mom! I'm home!"

Sakura's mother, Haruno Yukari, smiled at her daughter and greeted her.

"Welcome home, my little girl. My, you look so happy. Care to tell me how your day was?"

"It started like the usual, some meanies bullied me because of my hair and my forehead. Then this boy comes and he chased them away. He even broke their leader's nose when he tried to hurt him first! And it turned that boy was the son of the Yondaime, Naruto-kun! He then complimented my hair, my eyes, and even my forehead! He called it cute, mom! We then played together and we promised to play together tomorrow!" Sakura explained with the same, if not even more enthusiasm than Naruto.

At the moment she heard about Yondaime's son, Yukari had this soft nostalgic look appeared on her face as she listened to the rest of her daughter's explanation.

"Well, I think my daughter had found her first crush," Yukari smiled while Sakura was blushing hotly. She laughed at that. "Don't worry about it, Sakura. Now wash your hand and foot because dinner will be ready soon."

Sakura nodded while still blushing and walked to the bathroom to clean up. Yukari then walked to the cupboard and picked a certain photograph.

_'I won't let Sakura did the same mistake as I do. Please give my daughter and your son your blessing, Minato-kun.'_

The elder Haruno gently wiped the glass surface of the photograph before she placed it back to the cupboard and prepared the table for dinner.

The dinner in both Namikaze compound and Haruno household were always like the usual, save for the younger kids didn't stop talking about their new and first friend. As the clock hit 9.30 PM, the kids went to their bedroom to sleep, but not before saying goodnight to their family and to their friend. Even if they were apart, they said it at the same time.

"Goodnight, Sakura-chan."

"Good night, Naruto-kun."

X-O-X-O-X-O-X-O-X

**A/N: Phew, done! Yay, the first chapter of my 'A Different Path' is done! Took me a while for writing this because I have totally deconstruct everything in the story board and fix it so it will look better, in my opinion. I'll keep the original story since I really can't delete my first work, can I? What do you think? Better? Same? Worse? Tell me, 'kay? If you are new to this story and haven't read the original, it's okay. Just leave a review because I will glad to hear your comments and suggestions about this story of mine. And if you have time, check my profile to vote on the harem for 'Thousand Soul Phrases'. Speaking of that, anyone can guess what is the reference to that story of mine with this one? And it's not Setsuna! The hint is: Chapter 2. Have a nice day! **


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